INJURIES FROM MOTOR-CARS

Southland Times, Issue 23297, 6 September 1937, Page 6

INJURIES FROM MOTOR-CARS

NEED FOR PROOF OF NEGLIGENCE

PROPOSED MEASURE FOR COMING SESSION (Special to The Times) WELLINGTON, September 4. Among the major measures that Parliament will be asked to consider during the coming session will be legislation to do away with the need for proving negligence as a basis of damages for injuries caused by motor-cars. This will be in charge of the AttorneyGeneral (the Bon. H G. R. Mason) who, in an interview today, said that he hoped to have it made law during this session.

“The proposed measure will be original as far as it concerns those parts of the world where the law is based on the common law of England,” said Mr Mason. “They comprise practically the whole of the English-speak-ing world. It is, in fact, something new and it is original as far as most of the world is concerned. There is an analogy in the Workers’ Compensation Act where a worker gets compensation for an injury, irrespective of whether or not it arose from any fault on the part of the employer. Great as has been the benefit of the Workers’ Compensation Act, however, it so happens—fortunately or unfortunately from whatever point of view you may regard the question—that the proposed new Act promises to be of much greater importance because the toll of injuries due to the motor-car is becoming so very much more prominent in our accident statistics.

“Irrespective of the question of public policy involved,” added the Minister, “the change has become a practical necessity because of the complexity of the issues relating to contributory negligence which have developed in our courts in these classes of case. The removal of the need for this litigation, I believe, will be of great advantage, particularly in those cases where, as so often happens, the victims are people ■of slender means.”